Spotlighting the Santa Fe Trail during its bicentennial, this program explores the forces that spawned the trail and shaped its development. In 1821, a small group of traders from Missouri ventured to Santa Fe, then governed by Mexico, taking sizable profits back with them. Trade soon grew in what became a seasonal movement of covered freight wagons rolling back and forth. Merchandise from Europe and the East Coast flowed through St. Louis and up the Missouri River, spawning new cities that became primary points of departure for caravans heading west. Furs, fleeces, woven goods and silver flowed east.

In 1846, “The Army of the West” marched down the trail after Congress declared war with Mexico. The Americans took control of Santa Fe without firing a shot and by war’s end, most of northern Mexico was ceded to the US. As the military presence along the trail increased, so did tensions with Native Americans, which eventually led to their forced removal from the plains.

Conflicts that escalated into civil war also occurred along the trail beginning in the 1850s.  As the Civil War progressed, military engagements on the western end of the Santa Fe Trail played a significant role in the war’s outcome. After the war, as railroads built westward, the eastern terminus of the trail migrated further west as well. In 1880, when the rails reached Santa Fe, commerce on the trail came to an end, closing a pivotal chapter in American history.